A South Florida teen was taken into custody after, authorities said, he illegally accessed the Miami-Dade Public Schools database and changed four students’ grades.

Eighteen-year-old Jose Bautista, a senior at Dr. Michael M. Krop Senior High School in Northeast Miami-Dade, faced Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Thomas J. Rebull, Friday. “You’ve been arrested on four counts of offenses against intellectual property, public records exemption and four counts of offenses against computer users,” Rebull told Bautista at the bond hearing.

Miami-Dade Schools Police arrested Bautista on Thursday. They said the teen took money, hacked into the school’s computer system and changed students’ grades. Police said each of the counts Bautista is charged with represents one of the students for whom he altered grades.

“It’s not fair to the people that really try,” said Mayan Dehry, a student at Bautista’s school. “Like, I know a lot of kids are in AP classes, and they try really hard to get the grades that they get. I don’t know, if you’re just going to be lazy and then change your grades, that’s not what learning is about.”

So we know there’s a LOT of kids out there who want to do this kind of stuff, some to actually change their grades (but that’s unlikely, if they can hack the system they are probably smart enough to get high grades without much effort), some to prove a point to the school (Antiestablishmentarianism) and some for peer recognition (yo I hacked school I’m cool dawg).

Fellow student Brett Curtis said Bautista’s actions are not representative of the majority of his peers. “We have almost 3,000 kids here who come to school every single day, who work hard for every single grade that they earn,” he said.

News of Bautista’s arrest spread through the school Friday, even reaching the ears of faculty members. “I’m not surprised. The way that kids today are able to [use computers],” said teacher George Lesperance. “All I can say is, I’d have to get more information.”

Curtis said he is certain school officials will make sure the students involved will be brought to justice. “If it is true, it’s definitely not fair to the rest of the students,” he said. “It certainly makes me angry. Like I said, I can’t guarantee or tell you if it happened or not, but we have an amazing administration that will get to the bottom of it.”

When Bautista was booked into jail, his eyes were red and watery in his mug shot. In bond court Friday, a public defender spoke on the teen’s behalf. “There’s no legal basis for four counts of either of the charges,” said the attorney, “since there’s nothing specifically alleged as to the number of times this was allegedly done.”

Bautista’s bond has been set at $5,000.

The teen remained behind bars on Friday. Once released, he will be on house arrest and will be required to wear a GPS monitor.

I honestly don’t think he’s much of a flight risk, and his bail is fairly low – so it’s not too bad. At least they aren’t trying to pin some kind of bullshit terrorism charge on him like poor old Gary McKinnon.

It shows though school systems are pretty secure as we get to see this kind of news pretty rarely, and we know there are people trying to change their grades every day. Either that, or there are a lot of smart kids out there changing their grades without getting caught!

i dont agree with firing the schools IT admin. afterall, the kid got caught by the IT admin. Its not uncommon to have intrusion occurrences. Your ability to detect them and secure them is what makes you better off. If the kid were to be as good as being able to hack, he shouldn’t have been caught.

Urban Dictionary: antiestablishmentarianism
Marked by opposition or hostility to conventional social, political, or economic values or principles, the doctrine of opposition to the social and political establishment
Kanye West has been fed his dinner of antiestablishmentarianism, washed it down with a carafe of idiocy and spewed it all up during the hurricane katrina disaster fund telethon